This phrase is part of the headline of GM Andy Soltis’s column in this month’s Chess Life. Really? In this day and age, with WGM and Women’s Champion Jennifer Yu on the cover, the Women’s World Chess Championship on the banner on CLO and US Chess’s strong promotion of women’s chess, how does a retrograde headline like this make it into CL? Suppose Jennifer Yu is your older sister. Are you supposed to be ashamed to “settle” for beating her? Of course not.
US Chess has come a long way in promoting women in chess. Shooting ourselves in the foot needlessly with this kind of sexist headline doesn’t help that cause.
The last paragraph of the article says that beating his older sister was Magnus Carlsen’s motivations to get better at chess, but it’s hardly obvious in the article the way a headline should be (the “Training Up” is the main theme of the article). I never said switching genders would make the headline “OK.”
The US Chess President, Allen Priest, has an article in the same issue highlights the quote “…the most diverse place in America is the floor of a US Chess national scholastic tournament,” and talking about the values of US Chess and that we need to be clearer in their presentation. Mr. Priest continues, “And all must be welcome and all must have equal opportunity to play.” I agree.
I certainly don’t think this was intended to be a slam at female players, but things look different in cold print at times despite everyone’s intentions. I know. I have been there and had to make it right with other people.
It made you read the whole article, didn’t it? That is the point of a headline, to tease, to provoke you to read further to discover whether your initial assumption is true or not.
i know you didn’t say that, that’s why it was phrased as a question. i just tire of the kowtowing and pandering to the “enlightened, politically-correct” crowd which i find is usually neither.